


The Light of Music and Memory

by StarlitQueen



Series: The Songs and Starlight Series [2]
Category: The Hobbit - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Crossover, F/M, Ireland, Love, Magic, Memory Loss, Middle Earth, Mirkwood, Romance, Stars, Thranduil in the modern world, Under A Spell, this should be amusing
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-12-27
Updated: 2015-12-30
Packaged: 2018-05-09 17:13:02
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,635
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5548664
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/StarlitQueen/pseuds/StarlitQueen
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Nemireth journeyed through the gates of the Undying Land, her spirit was sent to another world, our world. Now called Emma Marie (but preferring to go by Emry) she lives a happy life completely unaware of her past life as an Elf.<br/>Her story begins again one strange night when she is pulled from a freezing lake with no memory of how she got there. Not long after, a mysterious and devastatingly handsome stranger appears from out of nowhere, and he is clearly drawn to Emry. He is, of course, Thranduil, the Elven King of Mirkwood. But that name and those words mean nothing to Emry anymore. But Thranduil knows that somewhere deep within her are the memories of her Elven life. He will do whatever it takes to help her remember, though it will not be easy.<br/>Emry cannot help but feel attracted to the attentive stranger with an even stranger name. But sometimes his words frighten her more than they delight her. Sometimes she feels that she has heard his beautifully spun stories before. The clear line of reality will blur from Emry as she tries to keep a hold on her sanity.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Call

**Author's Note:**

> I highly recommend reading the first part of this story before reading this one. I've tried to give all of the necessary details in the first chapter and in the description but where's the fun in that?  
> This story will follow a similar style of the first one only because this story is set in the modern world, it will feature more modern songs :)  
> I chose the setting specifically because when I first began writing a Feast of Songs and Starlight I happened to be vacationing in Ireland and I found the country to be completely inspiring in every way. So if you are a reading this and you are from Ireland, I think your country is spectacular and I'm sorry if I get any of the details wrong.  
> Songs: Cloudsong - Anuna & The Call - Celtic Woman

Nancy McCreedy didn’t think herself a boring woman. Affectionately called Granny Nan by the community, she thought herself a very exciting woman indeed. Well, as exciting as a woman in her late seventies could be. She was still able to drive herself and her husband into Galway twice a week for a night on the town. And she still hiked when she could. It was true that she could no longer scale the cliffs the way she did when she was a girl, however she was more than steady on her feet.

Yes, she tried to do something different every day. But there was still one part of her day that stayed the same. Every night at dusk she went outside to sit on the porch of her cozy stone cottage. She’d sit in the wooden rocking chair her husband made for her over forty years ago and she would watch the night close in on the world. She liked to greet the stars. Also, she could never pass up the chance of seeing a faerie. They were skittish now a days but everyone knew they were still about.

It was during this nightly routine that the most extraordinary occurrence she’d ever witnessed happened. It all started when she was rocking in her chair, wrapped up in a thick wool sweater, with a hot cup of tea in her hands. The sky had yet to fade to indigo and only a handful of stars had appeared. She could clearly see the outline of the thick cluster of trees that sat on the edge of her property by the road. If she looked a little further down she could see the curve of the pebbled road weaving between the hills.

A car was winding down the road. Not a common sight but not completely unexpected either. She couldn’t make out any details beyond the glare of the headlights, but the only thing out that way was the Burren Perfumery, so the car must have come from there. It was too late for patrons to be leaving. The Perfumery had closed hours earlier. It must have been one of the shop girls heading into Galway.

Granny Nan watched the lights flicker in and out of view as the car entered the thicket of trees. Then the lights stopped moving, right in the middle of the miniature forest. Granny Nan frowned in concern. Perhaps the car had broken down. She decided to wait five minutes and if the car didn’t move on she would go inside and fetch her husband, who was feet up in his armchair watching the news. He was quite the handyman and could help any stranded vehicle better than she could.

But she didn’t have to wait more than a minute before she saw a figure tearing through the trees into the field like the hounds of hell were nipping at their heels. She could still made out a flash of brilliant red hair through the twilight. Though many a lass had the red locks of Ireland, Granny Nan knew of only one will hair quite the exquisite.

It was young Emma Marie Waight. She was, in fact, one of the shop girls at the Burren Perfumery. A patron favorite, actually. Granny Nan got to her feet and without taking her eyes of Emma Marie, she opened the cottage door and called to her husband.

“Barty, Emma Marie is running through our field like a woman possessed!”

“Who?” Came Barty’s voice from the sitting room. Granny Nan rolled her eyes.

“Emry!” She called again, using the girls’ nickname. A name that was actually bestowed upon her by one of Granny Nan’s youngest grandchildren who had taken a liking to the girl on a visit to the Perfumery but could not say her long name properly. Since then, Emry had taken the place of her true name.

“Is she all right?” Barty asked, now seeming to fully understand the strangeness of the situation.

“I’m not sure, I’m going to go fetch her. Have some tea ready,” Granny Nan requested before switching her slippers for her boots and trudging with determination in the direction Emry had been running.

Once she made it to the far side of the field, she found something white in a pile on the grass. It looked to be Emry’s sweater. It must have fallen from her as she was running. Granny Nan looked around. There was no sign of anything chasing the girl. What on earth had gotten into her?

Granny Nan picked up the sweater and continued walking briskly in the direction that Emry was running. A few yards ahead, Granny Nan found another swath of fabric. It looked to be a cream colored woman’s blouse.

“Oh good heavens,” Granny Nan gasped, picking up the shirt. As she continued walking she found a trail of what could only be Emry’s clothing. When she bent down to pick up a solitary boot that had fallen near a shrub, she heard a most haunting voice being carried on the wind.

 

_Here my cry in my hungering search for you…_

 

Granny Nan shuddered. Could that have been Emry? The faeries were being wicked tonight, that was for sure. She hurried along, following the trail of discarded garments. One thing was clear, Emry was heading for the lake. And it looked like she was planning on a swim. Heaven knows why. The lake was frigid all year round. Emry would catch her death going into the water, especially if she wasn’t wearing a stitch of clothing.

 

_Taste my breath on the wind…_

 

The voice came again. There was no way it came from a creature of this earth, Granny Nan decided. Though it was beautiful, that voice sent a chill into the bones. As Granny Nan huffed over the small hill that looked down over the lake, she found Emry exactly where she expected to find her. Though Emry was not swimming in the lake. She was standing perfectly still. Her arms and back were exposed to the chilled night air. Her legs and backside were concealed beneath the black water of the lake. Her white skin looked as if it were glowing under the timid starlight.

“Emma Marie Weight!” Granny Nan shouted as she stormed to the water’s edge. She was about to start the scolding she was famous for with her children and grandchildren but the words died on her lips. The voice came again. It was Emry.

 

_Open your heart_

_I am calling you_

 

The words seemed to ripple over the water. Every tree, every rock, and every blade of grass seemed to tune in to her. Even the stars seemed to crowd closer, as if they too were listening.

 

_Right from the very start_

_Your wounded heart_

_Was calling too_

 

“Emry!” Granny Nan called again. Emry could not have been more than twenty feet from Granny Nan, but the old woman’s words were not reaching her ears. Granny Nan moved along the edge of the lake, in an attempt to get the girls attention. In the bleak twilight, it was hard to make out Emry’s face but one thing was clear. The girl’s body was very much on earth, but the rest of her was somewhere else. The faerie realm perhaps.

Granny Nan put a lot of belief in faeries. More so than the rest of Ireland’s population. Many thought her beliefs to be the endearing superstitions of an old woman from an old family. Granny Nan sometimes agreed with them. But in her long life, she’d seen enough strange things to know that magic was alive in the world, and it had wrapped its translucent fingers around Emry.

 

_Open your heart_

_You will find the answer_

_When you answer to_

_The call_

 

“Emry!” Granny Nan called again. “Emry I need you to answer me!” But Emry just began to sing again. She sang the same verse over and over until the light of day was long gone and the stars had taken over. At one point, Granny Nan looked up to the sky and was astonished to see how brightly she stars shown that night. She had never seen so many before.

A sharp cry and a violent splash brought Granny Nan’s attention back to the lake. Emry was no longer standing, but flailing in the water.

“Emry!” Granny Nan called. Emry’s head whipped around. Her eyes were wide with panic. “Emry, it’s Granny Nan.”

“Granny Nan?” Emry sputtered. “Where am I? What happened?”

“Deep breaths, girl. Stand up, you’re only in about waist deep. Come on, that’s a good girl.”

Like a newborn deer, Emry walked on trembling bare legs until she stumbled onto shore. Granny Nan did her best to cover the girl with her discarded clothes.

“Come on, dearie. Let’s get you into the house,” Granny Nan soothed. Emry’s gaze was fixed on the lake.

“I don’t understand what happened!” She cried. “Why am I here?”

“You don’t remember?” Granny Nan asked. Emry shook her head vigorously.

“Not a thing! I closed up the shop and was getting ready to drive to Galway for the night.” Emry’s voice was growing tight with tears.

“It’s all right love,” Granny Nan smoothed the girl’s damp hair. “It was just the faeries being wicked. That’s all. They are thick in these parts.” Somehow, that seemed to calm Emry more than anything.

“Must have been the faeries,” she repeated, nodding her head.

“That’s a good girl,” Granny Nan smiled. “Now, let’s get you into the house and into some dry clothes. Barty’s got the kettle on. You’re more than welcome to stay here tonight.”

“Thank you, Granny Nan,” Emry sighed laying her head on the old woman’s shoulder as they walked back to the cottage. Both were oblivious to the way the stars watched their every move. Nor did they notice when the stars began to whisper.

 

 

Far away in another world with different stars, the Elven King of Mirkwood shot up in bed. He could still hear it as he gasped for breath, as he wiped the sweat from his brow. It was hear voice, it couldn’t have been anything else. Though it had been years, decades since he had last heard her sweet voice, he knew that voice anywhere. He had dreamt of her many nights, but this was far too real to be just a dream. He could still hear her words echoing in his ears.

 

_Open your heart_

_You will find the answer_

_When you answer to_

_The call_

 

“Nemireth, I’m answering your call,” he said to the darkness. “Where are you? Tell me where you are and I will find you.” And he wouldn’t hesitate. A sickness was choking his land. A dark evil had returned. Soon the elves of Mirkwood would leave Middle Earth forever.

Suddenly, a silver light filled the room. Not blinding, but gentle.

“You’ve heard her call,” a voice genderless, fluid voice came from the light. The voice of the world beyond. “And you have answered.”

“What do I do?” Thranduil asked desperately. “How do I get to her?”

“Carry on with your plans to remove your people from this land. It is your final moments with them. Believe me when I say you do not want to lose those moments. When you sail across the Water, through the gate of the Undying Lands, I will send you to her world.”

“How will I find her? Will she know me?” He demanded. The light flickered.

“Those are not questions I can answer. But I can give you my word that you will find her.” Before Thranduil could ask any more questions, the sliver light faded away into nothing. He forced himself to be content with the knowledge that he would find his Nemireth again.

Unable to lay still in his bed, he yanked on a dressing robe and walked through the silent halls of his kingdom until he reached the Grand Hall where he had first seen Nemireth. The memories of that night were one of his few comforts in this world. Especially now since his son, Legolas, left the Kingdom, never to return.

Thranduil walked out onto the connecting balcony, where Nemireth had sang for his ears only. They danced under the stars for hours before falling asleep on the stone bench. Thranduil went to that bench now. After many sleepless he found that he could only find the faintest peace of mind here. And with the promise of another world, and another chance, he drifted back to sleep.   


	2. Mist, Faeries, and Dreams

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Thranduil and his people have completed their preparations to leave middle earth, Granny Nan gets a surprise, and Emry cannot shake the longing feeling that has clung to her since her unexpected swim.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So as I was writing this chapter, I realized if I put everything I wanted to put into it the final product would be waaaay too long for one chapter. And I think im going to run into this problem in the future. So I've decided that while music is still going to be a large part of the story, there might not be a song in every single chapter, just for the sake of keeping the chapter lengths reasonable lol. But that means that overall there will be more chapters and the fic will be longer so yay!  
> Anyone want to guess which Taylor Swift song will be making an appearance soon?

The preparations for leaving Middle Earth were taking longer than expected. Though his subjects were in agreement with his decision to leave, the White Council was not. They urged him to stay and fight for the land, though Thranduil suspected that Lord Elrond desired to take his people away as well, though he was not ready to admit it.

Thranduil stood by his decision and the moment the first whisper of darkness shuddered through the world, he led his people out of their beloved forest, leaving it and all it was to wither and die. It was not an easy thing to do. Thranduil could not let his people know how it pained him to leave their home behind. He could not confide in anyone the shame he felt from leading his father’s kingdom to ruin. More than anything, he wished to see his son one last time before they were parted forever, but he knew that was impossible. He didn’t have the slightest idea of where his son was. He didn’t even know if Legolas was alive or dead.

He rode with his head high, refusing to look back. The only thing that kept him going was the knowledge that he was doing what was best for his people and the small shining sliver of hope that he might see his Nemireth again.

He was the last to board the ship to the Undying Lands. Keeping his back to his homeland, he surveyed his subjects. Many were staring at the glittering sea with bittersweet expression. A few met his gaze and nodded with assurance. No one spoke. The ship left the dock with a gentle push and glided smoothly towards the mist of the otherworld.

The mist surrounded Thranduil. It grew so thick that he couldn’t see his people anymore. He listened for the voice that had spoken to him weeks before in his chambers. But there was only the gentle lapping of water on the side of the ship.

“Hello, Thranduil,” a gentle voice came from somewhere in the mists. It was not the same voice he had heard before, this one was distinctly female. For a moment he thought…but no it couldn’t be. That was impossible.

Shapes began to take form in the mist until a figure of a woman stood before him. Thranduil gasped and staggered backward, bumping into the rail of the ship. His eyes filled with tears for he was staring at the radiant face of his wife.

“How?” He gasped.

“I have taken on the responsibility of guiding you to your new life,” the woman in the mist answered, smiling a radiant and familiar smile. “I’ve been watching over you, darling.”

“I-,” Thranduil stammered. He didn’t know what to say. Never in an eternity did he think he would see his wife again, even if it was just her spirit appearing in the mist.

“You don’t need to speak,” she chuckled. “As I said, I’ve been watching you. I’ve seen the light within you blow out completely. You’ve become a shell of your former self, especially now that Legolas,” she paused, sighing deeply, “has chosen to walk his own path.”

“The joy in my life left when you did,” Thranduil said quietly.

“But that isn’t entirely true,” she replied with a smile. “You have found a small bit of joy in your life. That little singer of yours, Nemireth.” A hot burn crawled over Thranduil’s cheeks and he tried to think of something to say. His wife tossed her head back and laugh, her long locks swirling about her in misty tendrils. “Darling, you don’t need to make excuses. I have been gone, and you have honored my memory. You have more than earned your right to happiness in your next life. And it would be my honor to help you on your journey to it, just like I helped Nemireth.”

“You helped her?” Thranduil asked, his eyes growing wide.

“Yes,” his wife answered. “As I helped her find her way to a new world, I saw into her heart. And it was filled with love for you. Leaving you behind was her only regret. Just like it was mine.” Thranduil lowered his head and brushed a tear from his cheek. “Now there is nothing that can be done for me,” she continued. “This is the path I’ve chosen, helping others find rest and a new home. But there is still a chance for Nemireth, and you, to have your happiness again.”

“You can never be replaced,” Thranduil said smiling gratefully at the rippling image of his wife. She smiled.

“Close your eyes, surrender control to the wind and the waves. You will be where you are meant to be,” she whispered.

“And what about you?” He asked, letting his eyes slip closed.

“I’ll remain here, tend to those who enter the Undying Lands. Perhaps one day, our son will pass through,” she said hopefully. “But until then I will watch over him the way I have watched over you.”

“Thank you,” Thranduil whispered, but his voice was lost to the mists as the world he knew fell away forever.  

 

Ever since she had pulled Emry out of the lake two weeks ago, Granny Nan felt an odd feeling whenever she went to sit on the porch at dusk. But she did it anyways. Ever since that night the stars had been bright enough to outshine the moon. Surely they would notice if she wasn’t out on the porch to greet them.

So there she sat, in her rocking chair with her tea and her sweater looking at the stars with an air of suspicion.

“What are you up to?” She asked the sky. The stars twinkled in response but as she did not speak the language of the stars, she did not understand what they were trying to tell her. Though it did not take her long to find out. Out on the far side of her property, she noticed a faint golden glow.

“What on earth is happening now?” She grumbled. As she stood to get a better view she wondered if it was time for her and Barty to check themselves in to a care center. She was getting too old to deal with faerie strangeness.

The glow was already twice and bright. Granny Nan realized it was directly where her little lake was. With a huff, she bundled herself in her sweater and stomped across the ground on yet another wild adventure in her own backyard.

The glow was nearly blinding as she came over the hill before the lake. The light was coming from underneath the surface and growing brighter by the second. The lake began to quiver and ripple like it was an ocean.

“Aye! What is it now, then? A lake monster?” She huffed. She found a spot on the shore where the wind wasn’t blowing quite as hard and watched the lake. The glow, though steadily growing brighter, appeared to be shrinking in size. Granny Nan began tapping her foot impatiently. “Well if you’re going to drag me out here in the middle of the night for your nonsense it would be wise not to take your sweet time with it,” she grumbled now thoroughly annoyed.

Now the glowing light was beginning to form into a shape. Granny Nan squinted. What that the shape of a leg she saw? An arm? A torso? Granny Nan nearly jumped out of her skin when a flailing fist broke the rippling surface of the lake.

“Oh goodness!” Granny Nan shrieked as a blonde head appeared in the water. She heard sputtering and gasping as whoever just appeared in her lake made its way clumsily to the surface. As the stranger got closer, Granny Nan realized they were definitely a man and most definitely naked. Long muscular arms pulled broad shoulders and a sculpted back out of the water. Long white blonde hair concealed his face. Granny Nan stepped up to the half drowned man and leaned over him. His wet hair fell to the side slightly and she could see one intensely blue eye peering up at her.

“I have just about had it with naked people crawling out of my lake,” she said. She shrugged off her sweater and draped it over the man’s shoulders before helping him up and walking him back to the cottage for a cup of tea and a chair by the fire.  

 

Just down the road, Emry shot up in her bed. She was freezing from head to toe, almost as cold as she had been the night she took an unexpected swim. That night haunted her still. She could still feel the electric desperation her body surged with as some force other than her own iron will piloted her to the lake. She still did not remember much about that night, but she somehow knew that whatever had happened needed to be done. Granny Nan told her she had been singing in the water. She even repeated a few of the world Emry had sung. It was nothing Emry recognized, but there was something about the words that were so sad and beautiful they calmed the desperation clawing at her throat.

_Desperate for what though?_ She thought to herself and she tried to calm the anxious fluttering in her chest. Once again unable to shake the unexplained sense of longing, she forced herself to lay back down in her bed. She curled herself into a ball and wrapped the blanket tightly around her to keep out the chill.

Suddenly she saw it, the face from the dream that woke her. A face she had seen nearly every night since the lake. She knew how often she dreamt of him, whoever he was. Yet she could never see him clearly. It was like shifting swaths of fog were always surrounding him, stopping her from ever seeing him completely. But she knew he was handsome. Every once in a while her dream would reveal the curve of a high, sharp cheek bone, the point of a proud chin, or the shape of a long face with a straight nose. She also knew he was kind. When she would see a glimpse of his almost painfully blue eyes she could see them shining with kindness. But sometimes she saw them shining with pain, or loneliness. When she saw that sadness in his eyes, after she woke she would carry sadness with her during her day. It hung about her like a dark cloud.

Emry huffed in frustration and rolled over. Just who was this dream person? And why did he affect her so much? She’d never admit it, but she had taken to looking for his face in the crowds when she was out and about.

Now, too restless to lay still, she flung the covers off of her. She went to her closet and grabbed a pair of jeans, a thick sweater, and her gardening boots. Sleep was no longer an option so she decided she would get a head start on tomorrows work.

Emry worked and lived at the Burren Perfumery full time along with the owner, a good natured woman named Elsie. Elsie lived in a spacious attic above the main shop while Emry lived in the smaller, but still very comfortable, attic above the tea room in the building across from the main shop.

Emry walked lightly down the narrow creaky stairs into the tea room’s perpetually messy kitchen and through the café, which even in the pale moonlight the pink walls were still vibrant. She looked quickly at the chalkboard that displayed the previous day’s goods. She made a mental note to rewrite it once she saw what the garden was offering today.

After switching on the small lights that illuminated the garden pathway, Emry began to survey the plants. Of course many of the blooms were sleeping, as she should have been. _Look at me, I’m jealous of plants,_ Emry thought with a dry chuckle. She made note of a few large lemons on a tree. She could divide them and use half for lemon cream tarts and the other half could go to Elsie’s workshop so she could turn them into something wonderful. Elsie made the most amazing perfumes, lotions, candles, soaps and so much more. The woman must have had some kind of magic in her. Emry could make a decent candle but beyond that her talents fell flat compared to Elsie. Which was just fine, since Elsie was more likely to burn anything she tried to bake. They made a good team and Emry was grateful for it. She didn’t have any family that she knew of.

Emry winced and brought her hand to her temple. There it was again. The sharp migraine she felt anytime she thought of the family she didn’t know, or really anything from her past before the Perfumery. It was as if her brain was conscious stopping her from conjuring up memories. Normally, Emry had pain killers for these headaches but she had left them in her room. Instead she walked over to the white sage plant, plucked a small spring and rubbed it between her hands. The soothing scent of the plant filled the air and Emry’s migraine disappeared quickly. She decided breakfast would be served with white sage tea that morning. With a hint of honey. She was planning on using honey anyway for the lavender honey bread.

As she continued walking she came across one of the mint plants. Thinking about sage and lavender, mint fit right in with the other soothing herbs. The tea room served mint tea every morning but she wanted to use it in another way as well. Catherine, one of the bakers in the tea room, made wonderful mint and rose petal scones. Inspired, Emry hurried towards the flowering section of the garden. The roses she needed weren’t difficult to find. They grew along a wire archway that curved over the garden path. Emry was searching through the sleeping buds trying to figure out which ones would bloom come morning light when something flickered in the corner of her eye.

She turned and among the leaves and thorny vines of the roses, she saw something pale and shimmering. She stepped closer, carefully pushing the thorns aside. Nestled among the roses was a flower she had never seen before. It was a small white bloom, fully open with petals shaped like long tear drops. What was more unusual than the fact it seemed to be growing from the exact same stem as the roses, was that it was glowing. It was as if a star had fallen to earth and become a flower. Odder still was that it seemed familiar to her, like she had seen it somewhere before but the exact memory was just out of her reach. Like the face in her dream.

Slowly, she extended one finger and gentle touched one of the petals that she knew would feel like silk. But the moment the pad of her finger made contact, the tear drop petals shrunk away, folding in on themselves until the shimmering glow vanished back into the night.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much for reading all the way through! These are some notes I wanted to add in the beginning but realized it would spoil some things in the chapter if I had them at the top.   
> So, a note about Thranduil's wife. A large theme in the first work of this series was that Thranduil felt guilty for feeling affections towards someone other than his wife. It's pretty obvious in the Hobbit movies that Thranduil never got any closure when it came to her death so I really wanted Thranduil to have that by having her spirit be the one to bring him to our world and bless his future happiness. I feel like without her approval, it would be kind of insulting to her memory for Thranduil to just go off and find someone else so I wanted to take care of that so his wife's presence wouldn't be a lingering question throughout the story. Bottom line: she loves him, she can never be with him again, she wants him to be happy, boom done! XD


End file.
